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COLUMBUS A SPANIARD 
AND A JEW 



By S 



HENRY VIGNAUD 



REPRINTED FROM THE 



sjy \^ \0 

VOL. XVIII., No. 3 APRIL, 1913 






[Keininted from Thi- AmI' Ki< an IlisioKicAi, Kkvikw, Vol. XVIII., No. 3, Apr., I913.] 



COLUMBUS A SPANIARD AND A JEW^ 

— 

S^SoME twelve or fifteen years ago, a Spanish scholar, Don Garcia 

de la Riega, a principal citizen of Pontevedra in Galicia, whose name 
has been given to one of the streets of that town, discovered from 
the local archives that in the fifteenth century a family was estab- 
lished there of the name of Colon, several members of which bore 
the same forenames as are to be found among the Colombos of 
Genoa, the kinsmen of Christopher Columbus. In 1434 and in 1437, 
there was at Pontevedra a Domingo Colon ; in 1438 a Bartolome 
Colon; in 1496 a Cristobo Colon; in 1434 a Blanca Colon. Now, 
Domenico was the name of the father of the discoverer of America, 
who had a younger brother called Bartolomeo, and a sister called 
Bianchinetta. Furthermore, Seiior de la Riega found out that 
during the same period there was at Pontevedra a Fonterossa family 
who had relations with the Colons, and who were Jews, if we are 
to judge by their Biblical forenames. 

Struck by these interesting coincidences, he asked himself if this 
Domingo Colon of Pontevedra might not possibly be the father of 
Christopher Columbus, and if Christopher himself, about whose 
birthplace there has been so much discussion, might not have been 
born in Galicia, instead of in Genoa, as everyone has come to sup- 
pose ; and might it not also be that the Discoverer's mother, whose 
name of Susanna is Jewish and whose family name of Fontenarossa 
closely resembles that of the Jewish family of Fonterossa of Ponte- 
vedra, was herself of that same family? 

Clearly the documents which have been brought to light establish 
nothing of the kind ; but, in the absence of explicit deeds to that 
effect, one may always fall back on hypothesis, which has precisely 
for its object the supplying of absent proofs. Let us suppose, for 
instance, that the Domingo Colon of Pontevedra married the daughter 

''Cristobal Colon Espanol! Conferencia por Celso Garcia de la Riega en 
sesion publica celebrada por la Sociedad Geografica de Madrid. (Madrid, tipo- 
grafico de Fortenet, 1898, pp. 43). 

La Verdadera P atria de Cristobal Colon. Por Fernando de Anton del Olmet. 
{La Espaiia Moderna, Jvinio, 1910. Madrid). 

The Secret of Columbus. By Hyland C. Kirk. (Washington, Hayworth, 1912, 
pp. 62), 

La Verdadera Cuna de Cristobal Colon. Por el Dr. Constantino de Horta y 
Pardo. (New York, John B. Jonathan, 1912, pp. 96). 



5o6 Henry ]'igiiaitd 

of a Fonterossa; that this girl was called Susanna, which was the 
name of Columbus's mother; that from this marriage came several 
children, the elder two of whom were Christopher and Bartholo- 
mew ; and, finally, let us suppose that between the years 1444 and 
1450, a period when troubles broke out in Galicia, Domingo, his wife 
Susanna, and their sons Christopher and Bartholomew left their 
native land and took refuge in Genoa, there changing their Spanish 
name of Colon into its Italian form of Colombo. 

Accept as facts all these suppositions and at once no further 
uncertainty remains ; matters being thus arranged, assume the form 
it is desired to give them, and Columbus becomes a Spaniard from 
the place of his birth and a Jew by blood as well on his mother's 
as on his father's side, for it is the custom of Israelites to intermarry 
among themselves. 

Sefior de la Riega next proceeds to study the question, and, as 
we are told, after long and minute researches he becomes convinced 
that things had happened just as he had supposed, and that the 
Colombos of Genoa, the father, mother, and brother of Christopher, 
as also Christopher himself, were no other than the Colons of Spain, 
and Jews of Pontevedra. 

It was to set forth this thesis that he gave a lecture, several times 
repeated and always welcomed with applause, before the Geograph- 
ical Society of Madrid ; it was in order to make it more widely known 
that Seiior Anton del Olmet made it the subject of a literary article 
in La Espana Moderna ; it was with a view to propagating it that 
Professor Hyland C. Kirk, of Washington, wrote The Secret of 
Columbus, and it was with the same motive that a learned gentleman 
of Cuba, Dr. Constantino Horta y Pardo, had 25,000 copies of his 
pamphlet La Verdadera Ciina de Cristobal Colon printed and sent 
to all the governments, learned societies, and distinguished personali- 
ties, with a circular in four languages in which the recipients are 
entreated to move heaven and earth — Que Removiendo Cielo y 
Tierra — in order to spread the tidings that Columbus was born in 
Spain, in the province of Galicia ! 

What is even more extraordinary than this noisy propaganda is 
the complacency with which was welcomed a thesis absolutely at 
variance with historic data accepted by all the world. In fact, apart 
from a few Italian publications, it was nearly everywhere received 
as an interesting revelation which would change history on a point 
which had been considered as definitely settled. 

It is time to restore things to their places, and we proceed to do 
so as briefly as possible. 



Girt 

Author 
ill 30 l«fl 



Columbus a Spaniard 507 

Without pausing at what is imiprobable in the suppositions to 
which Sehor de la Riega is driven in order to set his thesis on its 
feet, we shall confine ourselves to pointing out two weighty objec- 
tions which forcibly tell against its acceptance. The first is the ex- 
istence of authentic documents which reveal to us the family of 
Columbus established in the territory of Genoa from 1429 until the 
end of the century and even beyond it. The second is the testimony 
of Columbus himself, of his son Ferdinand, and of the greater part 
of his contemporaries, that he was a Genoese. 

These documents and evidences are so numerous and explicit that 
there is but one way to set them aside, and that is to deny that the 
first relate to our Columbus, and to misrepresent the second. Sefior 
de la Riega and his followers have not hesitated to adopt this method. 
As it is proved that there existed in all the Latin countries numerous 
families bearing the names of Colon, Coulon, and Colombo, three 
variants of the same word, they assure us, that the Genoa Colombos, 
looked upon as the kinsfolk of Columbus, had really nothing to do 
with him, that the Domenico Colombo, weaver of Genoa and Savona, 
mentioned in these documents was not his father, and the Christo- 
foro, son of Domenico and weaver whom they likewise mention, 
refers to some other person than the Discoverer^ Such an assertion 
signifies that conscientious scholars like Staglieno, Belgrano, Desi- 
moni, Salvagnini, Lollis, Harrisse, and others, who for years have 
examined, studied, and expounded these documents, have committed 
the grave error of attributing to Columbus a father, mother, brothers, 
a sister, an uncle, and cousins who were strangers to him. This 
appears so extraordinary that one waits with curiosity the proofs 
of so downright a condemnation of so many learned works carried 
on for many years, and justly esteemed. Let us see in what their 
proofs consist. 

Among the Italian documents referring to Cristoforo Colombo, 
son of Domenico, one of the most important bears the date of 1470, 
and therein he is represented as being nineteen years of age, there- 
fore placing his birth in the year 145 1, that is to say at a period later 
than the one in which he is supposed to have left Pontevedra with 
his father, mother, and brother. This document, we are airily told, 
does not relate to the Discoverer. Why? Because, according to 
Bernaldez who knew him personally, he was born in 1436 and was 
therefore thirty-three or thirty-four years old in 1470. But the evi- 
dence of Bernaldez is not to be accepted here, for among other rea- 
sons which prove him to be mistaken, there is one that is decisive; 
this is the existence of a document, discovered some years and com- 
ing from Columbus himself, wherein he declares, in 1479, that he 



5o8 Henry Vignaud 

was then over twenty-seven years of age, which confirms the first 
date." 

The Colombo who made this declaration, we are again told, is 
not our Christopher, who in 1479 was much older than twenty-seven. 
Senor de la Riega and those who adopt his views might have said 
to themselves that if Columbus was born in 1436 there was an 
interval of twenty-five years between his birth and that of his 
brother, a fact which would be quite abnormal. We possess as a 
matter of fact a deposition by Bartholomew, dated 1512, in which 
he states that he was then over fifty years of age.^ Bartholomew 
was therefore born in 1461 or 1462, and consequently could not have 
left Pontevedra between 1444 and 1450 with his brother Christopher 
who was not himself then born. 

These reasons are not the only ones we are given in order to 
deny that the Colombos of Genoa were of the family of Columbus. 
Here are some others. 'If the Colombos had been of kin to the Dis- 
coverer, they would not have failed, so we are informed, to put in 
their claims when he had become a great personage, which they do 
not appear to have done. / What then signify the legal documents 
whereby the creditors of Domenico, who had died intestate, sub- 
poena as responsible his sons Christopher and Bartholomew and 
Diego, all of whom, according to the said documents, were then in 
Spain?* We are answered that these documents are apocryphal. 
Well, then, is that also a forged document wherein Giannetto, Matteo, 
and Amighetto Colombo, sons of Antonio Colombo, Domenico's 
brother, agree to send one of themselves to their cousin Christo- 
pher, admiral in Spain — " amiratum regis Ispanie " — to solicit his 
protection?^ 

'The deeds of 1472 mentioning Cristoforo Colombo, son of Do- 
menico, and wool-stapler at Genoa — " lanerio de Janua " — also do 
not refer to the Discoverer they say, because he was then in Portugal 
and was about to marry. But, since the discovery of the deeds pro- 
duced by Salvagnini, it is demonstrated that Columbus landed for 
the first time in Portugal in 1476, and that it was not until after 
February, 1477, that he was able to establish himself in Lisbon, 
where his marriage must have taken place about 1479 or 1480, be- 
cause on his arrival in Spain in 1484-1485 with his son Diego, the 
latter was still a little boy. 

These are the proofs given by our authors in order to show that 

• See this docunient in the Americ.'\n Historical Review, XII. zyy-zyg 
(January, 1907). 

^ Los Pleitos de Colon (Madrid, 1892), I. 182. 

* Raccolta Colouibiana, Dociimenti, nos. 89 and 90. 
'^ Ibid., no. 83. 



Cohimbus a Spaniai^d 509 

the Colombos of Genoa were not of the Discoverer's family. The 
method they employ for the purpose of establishing as a fact that 
the contemporaries and friends of Columbus did not look on him as 
a Genoese is even more astonishing. We run rapidly through what 
they say on this point. 

On two separate occasions Columbus has himself written that he 
was born in Genoa, "jo nacido en Genova "', and, "en ella naci "." 
This, we are told, is of no value because it suited Columbus to give 
himself out as being a Genoese, for had it been known that he was 
a Jew from Pontevedra he would have been persecuted by the Inqui- 
sition. Moreover, it is added, his statement is contradicted by the 
testimony of a great many people. 

Let us run through this testimony. In the first place the son 
of Columbus is himself called as a witness, because in the life he 
wrote of his father he feigns not to know his birthplace. This is 
incorrect. In a particular passage of his 'book, the only one quoted 
by our authors, he speaks, it is true, of doubts which have been 
thrown on this point. But for him these doubts do not exist, for 
further on he states that at Lisbon his father found several of his 
Genoese countrymen, " della sua nazione Genovese ",' and in his will 
he thus describes himself: "Don Fernando Colon, hijo de D. Cris- 
tobal Colon Ginoves."® 

Let us turn to the younger brother of Columbus, to Bartholomew. 
One of these learned gentlemen informs us that he was born in 
Portugal, and this, he adds, justifies the belief that Christopher was 
also a native of that placg ; and, as proof of the fact, he quotes Gallo, 
a distinguished Genoese, vvho had intercourse with the Colombo 
family, and who wrote : " sed Bartolomeus minor natu in Lusitania ". 
Gallo did in fact write these words, but he added : " demum Ulis- 
sipone constiterat '', the full rendering being: Bartholomew, the 
younger in birth — " minor natu "■ — at length settled at Lisbon in 
Portugal.^ Anyone may see that this is not quite the same thing. 
But our authors are tenacious, and having once, scheduled an error, 
they stick to it. Not only, they further assure us, has Gallo said 
that Bartholomew was born in Portugal, but he makes the same 
statement about Christopher, and Bishop Giustiniani confirms his 
testimony. Indeed ! Gallo has written, " Christoforus et Bartolo- 
meus fratres natione ligures ac Genue ",^° and Giustiniani says, 

* Deed establishing the entailed estate, Navarrete, II. 228, 232. 
^ Historie, ch. v. 

* Col. Doc. Ined., XVI. (Madrid, 1859), 455. 
'Gallo, in Raccolta, Fonti, II. 188. 

'• Ibid. 



5 1 o Henry Vignaud 

" Christofori Coltim Genuensis ".^^ If that be not sufficiently clear, 
so far as the younger brother of Columbus is concerned, we have his 
own declaration that he was a Genoese in verses he wrote upon a 
map he had made for King Henry VII., ■' Genua cui patria est."^- 

Among other contemporary writers who do not appear to have 
said that Columbus was a Genoese our authors boldly enlist the 
following : 

Peter Martyr, who in one passage states that Columbus was a 
Ligurian, and further on makes this precise by writing he was 
" Genuensis " ;^^ Las Casas, who records that Columbus was " Genoves 
de nacion " ;^* Oviedo, who wrote, " fue natural de la provingia de 
Liguria, que es en Italia, en la Cjual cae la cibdad e senoria de 
Genova " ;^^ and Geraldini, who was a patron of ColumJj'Us, and who 
describes him as an Italian by nationality and a Genoese of Liguria, 
"Genua Liguria ".^° 

These are not the only witnesses. It may be said that the greater 
part if not all of the writers of the fifteenth and the beginning of the 
sixteenth centuries, who mention Columbus, consider him as being 
a Ligurian and Genoese. It is the same wath modern authors whose 
opinions carry weight in this matter, and, as our authors are pleased 
to include Harrisse and myself among them, I beg to state that I 
never wrote that Columbus " no habia nacido en Genova ". In full 
agreement with Harrisse, I have said exactly the opposite. 

•(The quaint manner of quoting the written opinions of authors is 
not the only strange thing characterizing these publications to which 
our attention is called with so great a dih\. For example, one ascer- 
tains with astonishment that critics who are anxious to correct the 
history of Columbus on an essential point are but ill informed upon 
a number of particulars in his life which are now thoroughly eluci- 
dated. Thus, they still believe that he was born in 1436, that he 
first went to sea when fourteen years old, that he sailed on every sea 
for a quarter of a century, that he commanded a galley for King 
Rene, that he appeared before the University of Salamanca, and 
other similar legends which modern research and criticism have long 
swept from the pages of history. On the other hand, they know 
nothing of facts established by the testimony of documents now at 
the command of every reader. 

They tell us that Diego, Columbus's eldest son, could not have 
been born in Portugal inasmuch as he knew not where was buried 

" Raccolta, Fonti, II. 345. 

"Las Casas, I. 225. 

" Second decade, book vii. 

" I. 42. 

^^ Book II., ch. II. 

''^ Itinerariutn. p. 302. 



Columbus a Spaniard 5 1 1 

his mother, whom neither he nor his father has anywhere men- 
tioned.^' Now Cohimbus has twice spoken of his wife: in a letter 
written at the end of 1500 and in his wilL^^ As to Diego, he states 
in his will that his mother is buried in the Carmelite Convent of 
Lisbon, and he expresses the wish that her remains be translated to 
Hispaniola.^* 

Their interpretation of a number of very simple facts is no less 
astonishing. All that they say about the Santa Maria, which Co- 
lumbus calls the Galcga, because she was built in Galicia, and about 
the names of Porto Santo, San Salvador, and Trinidad as coming 
from places so called in Pontevedra, lacks even common sense. The 
same may be said for their reasons why the name Hispaniola was 
conferred upon Haiti. According to them, Columbus chose this 
name because he was a Spaniard, otherwise, had he been an Italian 
or Genoese, he would have christened that isle Italiana or Genovesal 

Need we further quote among the proofs they adduce as to the 
Galician origin of Columbus that his real name was Colon, which is 
Spanish, and not Colombo, which is Italian; that in Portugal he 
passed himself ofif as being a Portuguese, and that finally those wdio 
say he was a Ligurian thereby admit he was a Spaniard, for Liguria 
is a synonym of Spanish origin ! 

One might criticize very many other remarkable statements in 
these publications wherein may be found at every page, so to speak, 
counterfeit assertions, false quotations, illogical deductions, and queer 
conjectures. But we have said enough to satisfy the reader that 
of all these authors who have written to establish that Columbus 
was a Galician of Hebrew origin, it is only necessary to retain the 
simple facts of the existence at Pontevedra in the fifteenth century 
of a Colon family of which several individuals bore the same fore- 
names as did those of the Colombo family of Genoa, and of a Fonte- 
rossa family whose name recalls the family of the Discoverer's 
mother, which Fonterossa family was probably Jewish. 

There is in reality nothing at all extraordinary about these facts.. 
The Colons swarmed throughout the Latin countries. Among fami- 
lies of this name appear several Domenicos, several Bartolomeos, 
who were not of Genoa. Nor were Jewish Colons wanting in Spain. 
Three were burned in Taragona in 1489, that is in Columbus's own 
day, and it was possible for him to have witnessed their suffering. 
The Colons of Pontevedra were probably Israelites ; but in order to 
see in them the Colons of Genoa it is necessary to distort well-known 
facts and falsify the evidence of contemporaries. It is the same 

'^ Horta y Pardo, pp. 45-46. 

^* Navarrete, II. 255, 314. 

'* His testament, in Harrisse, Christophe Colomb, II. 487. 



m 28 1913 



5 1 2 Henry Vignaud 

with regard to the Fonterossa of Pontevedra in GaHcia. Because 
several of them bore Bibhcal names and because the mother of 
Columbus was called Susanna Fontenarossa we are not entitled to 
conclude as to the identity of the two families, and consequently as 
to the Hebrew origin of our Columbus. The name Fontenarossa is 
purely Italian and we know whence it comes ; it derives from the 
valley of Fontenarossa to the northeast of Genoa where still exists 
a considerable market town of the name, and from it came the 
mother of Columbus. As to her name of Susanna, many Christian 
women have borne it and many bear it still. 

r_ Doubtless, in any case, it will be thought these were very poor 
reasons for making a Jew of Columbus; but our authors give others. 
Thus, this great man wrote in a Biblical style; he was fond of quot- 
ing the prophets ; by choice he preferred to read books that were 
either Biblical or of Jewish origin; he himself wrote a book oi 
prophecies ; his mystical signature seems to recall some Jewish doc- 
trine; Giustiniani says he was born of plebeian parents, which sig- 
nifies they were miserable and low ! Columbus left a legacy to a 
Jew ; Jews protected him ; he was avaricious; he thought himself the 
messenger of Jehovah; finally, he had a fresh colored complexion, 
fair hair, and aquiline nose, characteristics, as all the world knows, 
of the Israelite type, and particularly of the southern Jews. 

We have dwelt at some length on this singular thesis because it 
has taken so considerable a development that it was to be feared it 
might, from the force of bold repetition under different forms and 
in various languages, end in obtaining credit among those who were 
not well acquainted with the subject. We have thought it our duty 
to restore things to their places ; but in doing so we have regretted 
to see a man of letters like Senor de la Riega compromise his fair 
literary reputation by such an excursion which he could have had no 
interest to undertake, for it is really difficult to understand the object 
of so noisy a campaign. 

Is not the glory of Columbus exclusively Spanish? Was it not 
to Spain he carried his great designs? Was it not in Spain they 
were entertained, and was it not there that he was put into a 
position to carry them out? Was it not in Spain he founded a 
family, and had he not become so thoroughly Spanish as to lose 
the use of his own mother-tongue? What matter then whether he 
were born in Pontevedra or Genoa? Columbus, in whatever city he 
first saw the light of day, belongs to Spain and can be claimed by 
none but her. To her he owes what he was, and it is to him she is 
indebted for that New World whose existence he had divined, and 
in whose quest he went until he found and gave her to his adopted 
country. Henry Vignaud. 



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